First off, here’s a newsflash for you: Neither Jim Gilmore nor Jim Webb is going to be president of the United States. With Gilmore finally dropping his embarrassing (and largely invisible) quest for the Republican nomination, and Webb recently announcing that he will not mount an independent presidential bid, our dreams of an all-Virginian Jim/Jim […]
We’re going to kick off this week’s column with an unusual bit of product placement. Although we rarely endorse anything outside of C-SPAN call-in shows, we would like to take this moment to declare the Broadway musical Hamilton the best piece of politically inspired stagecraft since Frost/Nixon, and the best musical about the Founding Fathers ever […]
Ah, January in the capitol, when Virginia’s legislators swarm in from all corners of the commonwealth for the annual General Assembly session, bringing along the petty grudges and crackpot bills they’ve managed to generate over the previous year. And every year we sit in anticipation, just waiting for the next intemperate floor speech or ill-considered […]
Last year began, per usual, with politicians swarming the capitol for the kickoff of the General Assembly legislative session. Match each of the following attending personalities with a sordid detail from their past: 1) Former Governor Bob McDonnell 2) Current Governor Terry McAuliffe 3) Delegate Joe Morrissey 4) Senate Minority Leader Dick Saslaw 5) Senate […]
There’s no doubt that we have hobby horses we love to ride. Redistricting is a huge one, along with voter suppression, income inequality and the improbable perfection of Mark Warner’s teeth. But, believe it or not, we do not relish yet another opportunity to write about gun violence. Especially in a week when our patron […]
You know, it takes a special kind of politician to unite elected officials from all points of the political spectrum. When was the last time you can remember a lone figure whose bold actions drew the same response from his own party and his opponents, from liberals and conservatives, and, indeed, from all right-thinking Americans? […]
Well, as we predicted right before the voting commenced, Virginia’s latest round of elections ended up almost exactly where it began, with the Republicans holding a one-seat majority in the state Senate and a two-thirds majority in the House of Delegates. Despite a flood of advertising (much of it funded by outside interest groups), Democrats […]
Hard to believe, but yet another election is upon us, bringing with it the annual deluge of attack ads, yard signs, candidate forums and billowing clouds of special interest money. Per usual, a vast majority of the General Assembly races that will be decided next Tuesday are a foregone conclusion. Thanks to gerrymandering and a […]
So here are a few things you should know about Virginia’s Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment and Senate Minority Leader Dick Saslaw. They have a combined senate tenure of nearly 60 years, and have spent much of the recent past switching leadership positions as the Republicans gained, then briefly lost, then gained the majority again. […]
Int. living room—evening A large-screen television flickers, the pale light providing the sole illumination as a thin arm reaches out and flicks ash from a dying cigarette into an empty highball glass. Camera pans back, revealing the worn back of a La-Z-Boy recliner, along with its inhabitant’s other hand, thumb working furiously at the cracked […]